Like springtime rain
by Flare Warrior
Summary: Harry has the good fortune to be alive for the birth of a new species. (Or the Magic Eggsy au)


Harry had always rather liked the New People.

He was six years old when they first arrived. He was watching Tom and Jerry when the TV shut off and the Earth let out a terrible shudder, as if the planet herself was unnerved by her latest creations. After that they suddenly existed.

It was all anyone talked about for months, on the TV and the radio and in the streets, and everyone was panicked and riots broke out as fear swelled in the people who'd been around long enough to call themselves normal. Harry was too young to know much of this, though.

His dad went out and bought a gun. He kept it propped by the door with the safety off. They never had to use it, but one day it fell over and shot off his father's ear.

Everything was settled in the way that most things are settled when a large group of people dislikes and feels threatened by a small group of people. It was all sorted before Harry was old enough to say much on the matter. The New People were segregated, monitored, and quibbled over by rights groups and self-proclaimed purists as a new hot topic.

Lee was one, though Harry hadn't known until he was faced with the dark, sparkling dust that made up their insides. _Of course_ , he'd thought then, _of course._

And then there was Eggsy.

In the years since their arrival, the New People (who had since been renamed something that Harry couldn't be bothered to remember) had gained more rights. Still the bare minimum, but unlike his father Eggsy could at least hold a job without hiding what he was.

"Fuck you mate" he said when they first met "You think it's easy findin' a way out of the gutter when you're one of us?"

When he felt like looking, Harry was enthralled by how very otherly Eggsy was. There was nothing outward that marked him as inhuman, no extra parts like the movies often depicted. So if he felt like looking, what he'd see was the way Eggsy would trail his eyes along things Harry couldn't see, the way he'd swirl his hands when he was happy and make the wind kick up. He'd see the too-far focus of his gaze, the way the sunlight reflected off his skin just a tad too brightly.

When he felt like looking, he was enthralled by how very similar Eggsy was.

When he visited the mansion in midsummer he found Eggsy outside on the lawn with the glow of the universe around him, all the flowers in the field in fresh bloom. Eggsy stopped when he noticed Harry, some learned shame in his eyes.

"Where are you getting that?" Harry asked, and gestured to the cotton-candy bright gasses he'd been spinning into stars.

Eggsy looked rather like a child who was quite sure they'd done something wrong, but he moved his hands back to the floating stuff. "It's everywhere" he said, low and careful. The stars were bright above them.

"Show me" Harry said.

Eggsy cracked the most childish smile Harry'd seen on him and proceeded to do what Harry assumed was showing off, given how long he overslept the next day. He pulled the matter from thin air it seemed, set it alight and gave it gravity, filling the yard and stealing a glance at Harry every so often in growing wonder.

"No one's ever looked so long before" Eggsy said as he played with the magic at his command.

"I don't see why" Harry responded.

"They don't like it. It scares them"

Harry pondered what might happen to him if he touched anything that Eggsy's magic had touched. "Do you like it?"

Eggsy's hands paused. "Yes" he said.

Harry died. Eggsy took his place. Harry became the stuff that floated thought the channels that only Eggsy could see. Except Harry wasn't dead, and he woke up in a Kentucky hospital beside a befuddled elderly woman with a tooth logged in her fist.

When he got home, Eggsy was waiting for him. He grinned a mile-wide grin and was wearing a pair of Harry's glasses.

"Saw you when you were out" Eggsy said in place of a greeting.

Eggsy rubbed the inside of his elbow whenever he felt uncomfortable. It wasn't something that Harry meant to comment on, but it was also his poker tell.

Eggsy's shoulders went tense as he dug his thumb into the vein.

"You know what they do to us when we misbehave too much?" he asked, his eyes downcast.

Harry knew. Harry'd been too young to fight the legislation. Now it was too universally accepted. They injection was supposed to be painless.

"Tried it once on me."

Harry felt something in his chest seize.

"Changed their minds after they dosed me. Spent hours on the table. My heart stopped twice." Eggsy glanced up, then away "Feels like it's still in my veins, sometimes."

He grit his teeth, the muscles in his jaw bunching from the force.

"It's awful, livin' and dyin' on the whims of others."

Harry stepped forward and pried Eggsy's hand from his arm. If it weren't for his coat, Harry was sure it would have come away bloody. He sat on the table and turned Eggsy's wrist to press his lips to the vein.

Eggsy looked at him, his gaze dark and deep.

"You don't anymore."

They never got around to poker that night.

They faced one of the New People a year later. It really was bound to happen at some point. Even with all his training, all his years of experience, Harry was put out for the count in under forty seconds.

And Eggsy was the only one, the _only_ one, who could stand a chance against it. Harry only called the thing an 'it' because it never shifted out of it's other form. He could barely move from where he'd been thrown, and even if he recovered he knew he would be of no help this time.

The thing was large and glittered in the dim hall light, its skin like red water over its lithe body, its dark eyes bold in its face.

It wasn't something Harry had seen outside of early videos of the New People during the hunts that took place when they first arrived. This was the first time he felt fear at the sight of one of them.

Eggsy shifted to fight it. He seemed to extend outward in an after image, and then he was a shimmer of a deep blue blur that existed on a wavelength that Harry's eyes couldn't quite pick up on. Harry passed out.

He came to when Eggsy shook him, and Harry blinked hard to try to bring him into focus. "Harry!" Eggsy called urgently.

"I'm fine, I'm fine" he muttered, then reached out to hover his hands over Eggsy's skin. He had dark slashes over parts of him that Harry couldn't name, wasn't sure they had people to fix.

"It's nothin'" Eggsy said. He sounded nervous. Harry looked over his shoulder and saw the thing - the girl, laying in the center of the floor. Their fight had done things to the walls and the ground that made him press back a bit in concern. Some parts were raised and moving, others were black abysses that went forever.

"Help me up, Eggsy"

With more care than he'd ever taken before, Eggsy helped him to his feet. Harry looked over to the girl one more time, frowning. "Let's go" he said.

Back on the plane Harry stitched up his head and Eggsy cooled to a point where he could return to his usual form. Harry poured them both a glass of wine and settled across from Eggsy. "Alright?" he asked. Eggsy moved as if he were sore, but not as if he were seriously injured.

"Yeah" he said, taking a swig. "...are you?"

Harry scoffed "I've had worse head wounds."

Eggsy laughed a little, but sobered quickly "No, I know, I."

Harry looked on at Eggsy, who bit his lip and took another drink.

"Alright" Harry said.

Eggsy looked up at him from under his lashes, hope shining in his eyes.

Harry leaned forward and kissed him softly.

Eggsy smiled against his lips "Alright."


End file.
